- This is a complete round up of the
best camera apps for Android right now in 2020.
After testing them all out, I'm gonna
share my top recommendation, the number one
Android app that I'm using right now, and why.
Hey it's Justin Brown here from Primal Video,
where we help you amplify your business,
and brand with video.
If you're new here, make sure to click that subscribe
button and all the links to everything I mention
in this video, you can find links in the
description box below.
So let's jump into it.
Now, these days with a quick app
install, you can instantly unlock a ton
of advanced functionality, to take you results
even further when you're creating videos
with your Android phone or tablet.
But, there are a lot of apps out there to choose from,
and they're certainly not all made equal.
So in this video, we're gonna
take a look at the best camera apps right now,
and then get to my choice for the number one
after putting all of them through their paces.
And as we're going through, scroll down
and let me know in the comments,
what camera app are you using right now,
and what's your favorite feature.
So as I've said, there's a lot
of options out there, so I'm going to skip
those that aren't worth your time,
and jump straight into our shortlist
of the top options.
Now each of them has advantages and disadvantages,
including different features,
different levels of complexity,
and obviously different pricing models as well.
So make sure you stick around, as we run
through each one to make sure you're
ending up with the best fit for you.
Now I just want to add in here really quickly,
that each one of these camera apps that we're
going to cover will let you unlock
professional camera-like settings
on your Android device, so you're able
to have the most amount of control,
and functionality in features out of your device.
So we're not going to mention these things
as we dive into each of the apps,
we're only going to look at what's different
between them, not all of the commonalities.
So across the board you're gonna have access
to features like shutter speed, like ISO,
in some cases aperture, depending on which camera
you're using, or which phone you're using, and
also resolution, frame rate, and bit rate control as well.
And I also want to add that some of these
features may not be available to your specific device.
Given the massive amount of Android devices,
some of these features are only available to
some devices, in most cases the newer ones,
so if you do have an older Android device,
then maybe expect that there could be some features
missing when you install the app on your device.
The first app in our shortlist is Open Camera.
Now this is one that we've been using and
recommending for years, we even have
a full walk through tutorial on this one
which I'll link up in the cards.
But Open Camera is an amazing camera app, and it
actually has probably the most amount of settings
and control out of any of the apps that we're
gonna mention, or pretty much any of the camera
apps that are available on Android.
The overall interface of the app is definitely not
as nice as some of the other apps that we're going
to mention soon, but it is clean enough that you
quickly find what you're looking for
on the main dashboard page.
Once you get into the settings, however,
that's where there is just pages and pages of
settings and things that you can customize up
and tailor up.
You can even customize up
the main dashboard, the main GUI, and turn on or off
settings that you may or may not be using,
or don't want to have access to from that front page.
So even just quickly diving into the first page of the
settings, you can see that we've got more camera
controls, camera preview, on screen GUI,
photo settings, video settings, location settings,
processing settings, and if we open up video
settings, there is just a ton of settings in here.
Everything from your video resolution,
down to enabling a flat, or a log, profile,
specifying the maximum duration of the video,
what you want to app to do after you hit
that maximum duration, if you've got one set,
and this is just one page of settings.
Now even though the main screen is pretty basic,
and not as pretty as some of the other ones
that we're going to mention, I do like that you have quick
access to things like the video resolution, like
your exposure, your ISO, your shutter speed,
all from that front page, so that you don't need to
go and dive in and get lost in all the settings.
Now in regards to pricing, this app is free.
It is open source software, hence the name Open Camera.
It's totally free, so it's ridiculous that you
get access to all of this on your Android device,
for nothing.
So I would say Open Camera is going to be great
for someone, whether your an absolute beginner,
right through to advanced, but probably more so
the intermediate to advanced person.
Someone that is looking for all those advance features,
and advanced controls, and really wants to customize
everything up, and tweak and adjust everything,
then this is where Open Camera is probably going
to be suited to.
I would be a little weary if you're an absolute beginner,
because of the amount of settings and controls,
and everything in there, I think you could
definitely get overwhelmed with all of that
stuff in there, and not having a really
intuitive interface on the main screen,
may make it a little complicated and a little
overwhelming. But, overall, it's ridiculous
what you get access to, for free, in this app.
And that brings us to camera app number two,
which is Manual Camera.
Now this one in my opinion,
has a much nicer interface, it's much more intuitive,
it's much easier to find everything and to get up
to speed, creating your videos in this app.
It still packs in an absolute ton of features, and
a ton of settings, but what I like about this one,
is you can go to that settings area,
and scroll through, you're not diving trough
sub menus and sub menus just to find things,
and there's not an overwhelming amount of settings,
but with everything in there you can
quickly find what you need or what you have access to,
and then jump back to creating your videos.
So again there's a lot of things in here,
like showing a histogram, this focus peaking,
you've got all of your video bitrate controls,
and frame rate settings, your audio source,
your audio channels, so you see you still got
quite a lot of options in here.
If you want to be able to manually control things,
like ISO, the shutter speed, and the focus,
then you will need to enable that in the menu,
then you'll have access to those on the front screen.
Now just like with Open Camera I like that,
they've got quick access to things like,
the exposure, and the focus, right from that
main screen dashboard, without needing to
go into the menus to control everything.
I really like the way that they've done the
exposure settings in particular,
it's really quick just to tap on that exposure button,
to select your ISO, and your shutter speed,
really really quickly.
I also really like
how you can switch between the different focus modes,
from auto focus to continuous auto focus,
to manual focus, again just with a couple of
quick taps on the screen.
One thing I don't think
is as good in this app though, is the tap on an object,
or tap on your screen to adjust the brightness
or the focus and to lock it at that point.
You can obviously lock down your focus and exposure,
but it's not as quick as the next app that
we're going to be covering.
Now there is decent
control over the white balance and locking that down
either with a preset, or by manually adjusting the
kelvin slider to dial it in manually.
There's also some different affects, or different looks,
that you can apply, but really these are pretty basic
and they don't give you a great amount of control
over what your shot is going to look like in this app.
Now in regards to pricing, there's a free version
of this app, it does have some limitations
around it; you can only record for up to five minutes,
there's limitations around the recording quality,
or the resolution you can record at,
and there's also ads in the free version as well.
So what I would recommend is that your purchase
the app to kind of remove all of those restrictions,
and remove all of those ads, and it's
only going to cost you four dollars, ninety-nine.
So I think Manual Camera is an amazing camera app,
I think it's going to be really easy for
someone who is an absolute beginner to jump
into this, right through to a professional wanting
to lock everything down and control everything,
and tweak and adjust everything.
It's gonna be perfect no matter where you are
across the board. I think at that price point too,
it makes a really compelling offer
considering what you can do in the app.
And that brings up to our third app
on our shortlist, which is Filmic Pro.
Now this is another one we've mentioned
and spoken about quite a lot on this channel,
and we have another walk through tutorial on
Filmic Pro and I'll link that up in the cards.
But this one is really the OG when it comes to
manual camera apps, or advanced camera apps, for IOS
and for Android.
I would say Filmic Pro is
hands down the most professional camera app
on Android right now, given the pro features
and the pro tools that they have in there.
It does have an easy to use and intuitive interface,
I'd say it's probably not quite intuitive
as the Manual Camera app, but it's still
really quick to find everything, and it
would be really easy for someone to get
up to speed using this app.
Now in terms of the amount of settings
and features and everything
in this app, it definitely doesn't have as many as
Open Camera, I'd say it's probably a little
less than what you have in Manual Camera,
but the settings and everything you have in
Filmic Pro are definitely aimed more at the
pro-level user, as I said.
One of the stand out things with Filmic Pro that
none of the other apps we've mentioned come close to,
is the amount of hardware support that you have
in this app.
Hardware support for things like
gimbals, like the DJI OSMO mobile, or the
Zhiyun smooth four, and things like support
for anamorphic lenses or other lens adapters to again,
help you create professional videos on this thing.
Now while there are still settings and controls in this app,
they have broken it down into smaller categories
when you click that setting button,
instead of having one big list like you do in Manual Camera.
So for some things like resolution, obviously,
it's gonna make it easier for you to find,
but for other things, you might need to dive into
a couple of different sections there to
find what you're looking for.
But it's definitely nowhere near as complicated,
or as painful, as going through the menu
system in Open Camera.
Now one of the other areas Filmic Pro shines
in comparison to the other apps, is the level
of control you have in the look and feel of your shot.
Not only do you have great control over the white balance,
whether it's using one of the built in presets,
or whether you manually type it in,
or manually setting the kelvin level for the white balance,
you also get access in here to the tint as well,
which is something that neither of the other two had.
But you can also go beyond that in Filmic Pro,
unlocking what they call the Cinematography Kit,
which is an in app purchase, and this will
unlock far more control with different color profiles,
and the ability to customize everything up manually.
You can event down to making individual IGB color
level adjustments for your shot as well.
You also have the ability to set up, and save presets,
so that you're not having to manually set
everything up every time you want to shoot.
You could have a preset saved for the front facing camera,
setting the resolution, setting the frame rates,
and everything you like for that, and also one
for the rear facing camera, or one for
the wide angle camera if you've got one on your device.
Another stand out feature in Filmic Pro,
is how fast it is for you to be able to lock down
your exposure or your focus in this app.
You can literally just move the circle,
or the square, to different points in your shot,
to be able to lock down your exposure,
or to lock down your focus.
Then if you want to dial it down even further,
that's where you can dive into the more manual controls.
But just having that ability to be able to tap
on your screen and move the focus points,
and move the exposure point to different places in
your scene without them being linked together,
and without the need to do it all manually,
with sliders and those sorts of things,
obviously you've got those in there as well,
but this makes it really really quick to lock
down everything in your shot, and press record,
and start capturing.
Now in regards to downsides in this app,
there really aren't too many that I can think of,
besides the fact that this is the most expensive app
that we are listing in this video.
Definitely not a deal breaker, still amazing value,
but it is the most expensive app.
So with a segue like that, in regards to pricing,
Filmic Pro is a one time purchase of fourteen dollars,
ninety-nine, and if you do want to unlock those
extra color profiles and color control with that
cinematography kit, that is an additional
in-app purchase of thirteen dollars, ninety-nine.
So all up though, still ridiculously cheap
for what you're getting access to inside of this app.
Now I would say Filmic Pro is gonna be perfect for anyone,
whether you are and absolute beginner,
right through to an advanced user.
It's simple enough that an absolute beginner
could jump in here, and obviously start to
lockdown some of these setting, and unlock
some if these advanced features inside of the app
here as well, but it's also really a no-brainer
for someone in that intermediate through to advanced
pro features that are in here.
And obviously, if you're someone who was using
some of those supporting pieces of hardware,
like the gimbal stabilizers, then it's
really gonna make this a no-brainer for you as well.
Now if I had to pick one winner out of these,
my pick is gonna go to Filmic Pro.
Even though, Open Camera is an amazing offering,
and is totally free, and Manual Camera,
I probably love the interface a little bit more
than I love the interface inside of Filmic Pro.
But Filmic Pro really is the complete package.
I like the cinematography kit,
I like that you get control over the color profiles,
and could really dial everything in,
so for me my go-to is Filmic Pro for this year as well.
So now that you have your camera app sorted,
check out the link on screen now,
taking you the process step by step,
on how you can create amazing videos for Android device.
I'll see you in the next video.